Hi! So this newsletter is a little late. Looks like we’re going to have to fire our Editor-in-Chief and hire someone who doesn’t fall asleep on the job. Pathetic, right? Anyway, newsletter time! Yay! Yaaaayyy!

We feel like you are not as excited as you should be. Please readjust your attitude and shout “Yay!” with us.

Upcoming Appearances

Hey! Are you fascinated with the folks behind PMMP and wish to meet us in person? Excellent news! If you’re planning on attending any of the following Texas-based conventions this year, you now can totally hang out with us and discover just what type of trash we smell like.

We also intend on being at Texas Frightmare Weekend next year in Dallas, but no promises until the tables go up for sale and we snag one before they sell out.

Joe McKinney Praises Dead Men

With John C. Foster’s debut novel, Dead Men, just around the corner, the advance praise is beginning to light our office on fire. We thought we’d share with you one of its most recent blurbs, from Bram Stoker Award-winning author, Joe McKinney:

“With Dead Men, John C. Foster has crafted an utterly terrifying road trip from hell. This is a twisted knot of a story that will challenge you at every step. You thought you had Horror figured out, but you don’t know. You haven’t met John C. Foster. Frankly, I haven’t been this impressed with an authorial debut since Clive Barker’s Books of Blood. And no, that isn’t hyperbole. John C. Foster really is that good. He doesn’t read like a first time novelist. He reads like someone who knows where you live and isn’t afraid to kick down your door. Do yourself a favor and get this book. You won’t regret it.”

Meet the Strippers

Vincenzo Bilof introduces us to the strippers found in his new novel, Vampire Strippers from Saturn, with special guest appearances from Ava Gardner, Lady Gaga, and Christy Mack. Check it out here.

Your Favorite Indie Bookstores

We need your help, dear readers. We want to spread our diseases closer to your hometown. Do you have a favorite local bookstore? Is it in desperate need of some Perpetual Motion Machine? Then please email us at contact@perpetualpublishing with the details, and we’ll do our best to infiltrate your home.

“King of Beasts” by Alison McBain

The lion is roaring in his cage. The heavy smell of his pelt fills the room, even from where I'm standing on the far side of his small enclosure. Hard not to feel like I'm in a jungle somewhere with this tawny creature stalking me, assessing my status as prey. He screams again, and I shudder.

Don't ask me how I ended up in this dismal space station on the edge of nowhere. I know you don't care. Smile, please, when the cameras flash.

The lion roars.

I've imagined it—the bars, unable to hold the soul of a king. How he would come at me in slow motion and dislodge body parts in a spray of artistic red. My head would become a Rorschach blot against the wall, the long rope of my innards strewn in mystic patterns on the floor.

The spacers would shake their heads. "Only a matter of time," they'd say. "Got too close to the beast," they'd say.

I reach a hand through the bars in massive daring, making the spacers, who come and stuff credits into my account, gasp and shake in terror.

No, they don't.

You're right, they don't. Perhaps I only see mocking eyes glittering at me from a multitude of faces. Or perhaps there is something in that sea of brutal flesh that is akin to respect.

I tap the bars, one-two-three. The spacers look up at the sound, gazelles scenting a predator.

The lion roars.

"Come see the Earth-beast, last of its kind, the king of the jungle—step up, step up, don’t mind the noise. Raised him from a cub. I'm the only one he trusts,” I lie. “Don't get too near, sir, ma'am. Don't dare the strength of his cage."

They file past. Some stop and stare, others put hands over mouths, noses. Some hold their palms out towards the cage and press their fingers together quickly—taking pictures with their surgically built-in cameras. I have one in my palm, too, but it's ten years old, hardly worth the effort without upgrades. Not that I would want to take a picture of this godawful space station, a real junker of a destination held together with duct tape and string.

At one time, I was at the center of the galaxy. At one time, my show had class.

None of it mattered, really. All of it went to hell when Ron caught me going at it in our quarters with a random motherfucker and took the real deal away with him.
I wonder where he is now. I wonder if he ever thinks of me, skulking out here on the edge of the universe with nothing but a sack of nuts and bolts rolled up in a dead creature's skin.

Alison McBain lives in Connecticut with her husband and two daughters. She has work published/forthcoming in Flash Fiction Online, Abyss & Apex, and the anthologies Abbreviated Epics and Our World of Horror, among others. You can read her blog at alisonmcbain.com or follow her on
Twitter @AlisonMcBain.

Write for Perpetual Motion Machine

Attention authors: we are always searching for new writing to publish. Here are our current calls for submissions: